NASA announced on Tuesday it has canceled plans to deploy a space station in lunar orbit and will instead use components from the project to build a $20 billion base on the moon’s surface, while also planning to send a nuclear-powered spacecraft to Mars.
U.S. space agency chief Jared Isaacman, an appointee of President Donald Trump who took charge at NASA in December, announced an array of changes to the Artemis moon program including an aim to send more robotic landers to the moon and lay the groundwork for using nuclear power on the lunar surface.
NASA also disclosed plans to launch a spacecraft called Space Reactor 1 Freedom to Mars before the end of 2028 in a mission it said would demonstrate advanced nuclear electric propulsion in deep space. NASA called this a major step forward in bringing nuclear power and propulsion from the laboratory to space. NASA said the spacecraft, once it reaches Earth’s planetary neighbor, will deploy helicopters for exploring Mars.
The Lunar Gateway station, largely already built with contractors Northrop Grumman (NOC.N), opens new tab and Intuitive Machines (LUNR.O), opens new tab subsidiary Lanteris Space Systems, was meant to be a space station in a lunar orbit.
“It should not really surprise anyone that we are pausing Gateway in its current form and focusing on infrastructure that supports sustained operations on the lunar surface,” Isaacman told a crowd of foreign delegates, companies and journalists at a day-long event at NASA’s headquarters in Washington.
Repurposing Lunar Gateway to create a base on the moon’s surface – a difficult undertaking – leaves uncertain the future roles of Japan, Canada and the European Space Agency in the Artemis program, three key NASA partners that had agreed to provide components for the orbital station.
Hellbound and Down 